The Dumping Ground Christmas Special
by Seahorse8
Summary: My last dumping ground story was pretty rubbish, so I'm going to write a new one, but about the same character; Jody. This time, it's Christmas at the dumping ground, but when things start to go wrong, it's Tyler and Jody who get the blame. Can they find the real culprit?
1. Chapter 1

Everyone was planning what they were going to do for Christmas. Lily was staying with her dad, of course, and going ice skating with her sisters on boxing day. Rick was seeing his parents, too, and Faith was planning to spend time with her brother. Frank was staying with Liam and his brother, and Elektra with her sister. Harry with his aunt and uncle. It seemed almost everyone had a relative somewhere who couldn't look after them but wanted to see them for Christmas. Tee and Johnny were fine, they had each other. So that just left Carmen, Tyler, me, Floss and Mo. Great. I was fine with Tyler and Carmen, who are my friends, but Floss and Mo were seriously annoying. People always automatically grouped me with them and Harry as the "little kids" and expected me to play nice little games with them. As if! The only time I went near those weirdos was when I was playing pranks on them with Tyler. Anyway, there we were. Christmas was going to be just brilliant. Not that it wouldn't be an improvement on when I was living with my family. I hardly got any presents then, and my brother Kingsley always spoiled anything anyway. But still, I wished I knew what all those kids at school got so excited about. Christmas had never seemed like much of a big deal to me. Everyone else was complaining, too.

"Don't get excited," Tyler was telling Mo. "Christmas here is pretty crap. Basically we all just sit around arguing, complaining about presents and being bored Christmas dinner is good, though."

"Yeah," I agreed, "Last year there was a massive food fight. Elektra ended up with her head stuck in the turkey. Seriously, it was like a comedy show. "The Dumping Ground Christmas Special!"

"Everything else is really boring, though." Said Carmen. "It's just depressing."

"At least you're not spending Christmas in a prison, though." Rick said, glumly. "Lucky me!"

"Well we might as well be."

"Oh,come on!"said Tee. "Mike works really hard every year, making it fun for us. You should be grateful."

"Since when did you become miss positivity?" drawled Elektra. "Are you trying to be the new Faith Davis?" Faith was in the kitchen, baking mince pies. We could hear her singing along to Christmas carols. If anything was depressing, _that _was. And Elektra wasn't the only person who was annoyed at Tee

"At least you've got family," Carmen sniped. "Like Lily. It's not fair."

"Oh come on!" protested Tee. "Now you're being ridiculous." Suddenly, everyone was arguing.

"We really need to do something to brighten things up here." I muttered to Tyler.

"Yeah," he agreed. "This place needs a bit of fun."

"I heard that!" came Floss's voice. "And I'm telling if you don't -"

"Oh, buzz off, Floss." I said, annoyed. "Go help Faith or something."

"All right. At least she's having fun." And Floss stomped off.

"Great!" I said. "Now let's get on with making this the best Christmas ever!"


	2. Chapter 2

It was the 20th December, and school had just ended for Christmas, so that was one good thing. Only, like I said before, we weren't exactly filled with Christmas cheer. I could still hear people arguing from my room. And it was actually pretty boring sitting around doing nothing. I was so desperate that I decided to see how Faith and Floss were doing. At least they were cheerful. But I didn't even like mince pies.

They were just coming out of the oven as I went into the kitchen.

"I helped!" Floss said smugly, seeing me come in.

"We're going carol singing later, with Tee. Do you want to come?" asked Faith.

I left.

"It's ok! It doesn't matter that you're not that good at singing. It's taking part that counts!" she called after me.

I slammed the door. Loudly.

Then I went up to Tyler's room.

"So," I said, "What do you have in mind?" He shrugged.

"Well, it needs to be something special," I said. "How do you feel about dressing up as Santa Claus?"

"No. Bad idea." He said, hurriedly. "How about a food fight?"

"Definitely not." I said. "Save that for boxing day." We couldn't think of anything, but I knew we definitely had to do something. I could hear Faith, Tee and Floss getting ready to go carol singing. But everyone else was still arguing. Then, Rick came in, looking cross.

"Can't I have a bit of peace and quiet in my own room?" he asked. And slammed the door behind us as we left.

"Do you want to continue making plans?" asked Tyler.

"No. There's a Christmas special coming that I want to watch. I'll go into the living room. If I can hear a thing over the noise, anyway."

But only Carmen and Tee were still there.

"I'm going to ask Lily if I can stay with her for Christmas," Carmen was saying, as Tee scrabbled for her coat. "Beats being here, anyway."

"Oh, come on," Tee protested again. "Christmas could be really fun this year. And besides, it's a bit cheeky, inviting yourself." She went out.

"Tee, are you coming too? Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!" I heard Mo yell. Carmen sighed.

"At least she's got people who want her."

"I want you, silly!" I said. "Are you watching this show with me or what?" Carmen shook her head, and left. I could hear Tee and Johnny chatting in the background. But then Tyler came down, and I cheered up.

The carol singers came back just as the TV show was ending. I heard them all clatter into the kitchen. And then gasps and screams. We ran over.

"Someone's ruined all our mince pies!" Floss was sobbing. "All our hard work."

"Don't worry," Mike comforted her. "I'm sure you can make some new ones. In the mean time, who did this?"

"I know!" Floss said. "It was them." Everyone looked accusingly at me and Tyler.

"All right, what have you too got to say for yourselves?" asked Mike.


	3. Chapter 3

"It wasn't us!"I yelled. "what are you on about?"

"It was you!" Floss said accusingly. "You too didn't go carol singing, you both like playing pranks, and you said you wanted to brighten things up."

"Oh, come on!" said Tyler. "Do you honestly think we'd do something like that?"

"Who was it, then?" asked Faith accusingly.

"How the hell should I know?"I hated it when people asked questions like that. If I knew, I'd have just said straight off who it was. Still,it gave me an idea.

"I think we should leave it," said Rick. "Whoever did this was probably in a bad mood about something. And plenty of people here are finding things hard."

Mike agreed, but Faith, Floss, Elektra and Johnny were still giving us the evil eye.

"Just what we need!" Tyler said sulkily, later. "Everyone knows our plans, and thinks we smashed up those mince pies."

"Well, how about finding out who really did it?" I suggested. "We could be detectives. It would be fun, and also put us in the clear."

"Great plan!" said Tyler. "I'll go search for clues!"

I went to Carmen's room.

"You don't think it was us, do you?" I asked her.

"Of course not!" she said. "You two are about the only people here who didn't spend the afternoon arguing! I t was probably Elektra or someone."

"But why would Elektra do that? It's not like she had anything to be angry about. She's staying with her sister for Christmas. What reason would she have for doing something like that?" Carmen shrugged. "I don't know. But you know what she's like. She doesn't need an excuse to be poisonous. Tell you what, though, I am definitely not spending Christmas in this dump. I think I'll ask if I can stay with Lily, and I don't care what Lily says. If you want something done, you have to do it yourself."She paused. "Oh my word, what is going on down there? Go and check, will you?"

"Can't you do it yourself?"I asked,but went anyway. Mainly to get away from that grouch.

Tee and Mo were in the kitchen, making Christmas decorations.

"What was that noise?" I asked. Tee laughed.

"Oh, don't worry about that. We were just arguing about what Christmas music we wanted to put on. Mo wanted classical music, but I wanted something more fun. So we tossed a coin, and Mo won." I could tell. Sickly chords of "Do you hear what I hear?" were playing at full volume. Tee grimaced. "Never mind. Do you want me to teach you how to make origami baubles? I invented them in art yesterday (we were allowed to do what we wanted) and I've got this lovely gold paper which would look great -"

"No! I want to use my treasure!"Mo whined. Tee laughed again.

"OK, suit yourself. He's bossy, isn't he?" she said to me. "Do you want to help?"

"No,I'm allright." I knew too well where Mo's "treasure" came from to want to go near it. "Carmen's still determined to go to Lily's for Christmas." I said.

"Seriously?" Tee asked. "It would be good if her mum would visit once or twice. That might make her happier."

"Yeah." I knew how Carmen felt. My own mum wasn't exactly mum of the year.

Soon, Tee and Mo left. I went to get myself a mince pie (re made).Then I went to my room.

Suddenly, I heard a scream. I rushed downstairs.

"Somebody's ripped up the decorations we made!" Mo was sobbing.

"All right, this is getting serious." said Mike. "Who was it?"

"Her!" Mo pointed at me. "Jody's the only one who knew we were making them!"

_And Carmen_,I thought. And suddenly, something occurred to me. She was the most angry person here. And she'd said before, "If you want something done, you have to co it yourself. Oh no. Had she done all this?

**If you have any ideas for what can go wrong next, how Jody and Tyler get framed, and what they do about it please tell me. What do you want to happen next?**


	4. Chapter 4

"I told you before, I didn't do it!" I said angrily. But this time, not many people looked like they believed me.

"I think you'd better come to my office," said Mike. "You too, Tyler."

"Great." said Tyler. "Now we're really in trouble."

"So," said Mike, in his office. "Why did you to do it? Are you trying to sabotage Christmas?"

"I told you before, we did not do it!"

"Just own up to it, all right? It'll make things easier."

"Why should we? When can you get it into your head that we didn't do it?"

But Mike wouldn't listen. He even tried to make us apologize! Like I was going to do that.

"Well in that case," he said, "You're grounded till the end of the holidays."

"WHAT!" I demanded. "You can't do that!" I couldn't believe it. The only thing to do now was find the real culprit. So me and Tyler went up to my room to start the detective work. Of course, the first thing Tyler asked was if I had any idea who might have done it. I didn't really want to tell on Carmen, I mean she's my friend, but I didn't exactly have much choice, and besides, she wasn't a very good friend to do something like that. So I told Tyler what i thought.

"Yeah..." he said slowly. "Yeah... you might be right. But _Carmen_?"

"I know, but can you think of anyone else who might have done it?"

"No... we'd better question her."

"Yeah," I said, "Like she's going to admit to that. She might as well be saying, Mike, please ground me till Easter and stop my pocket money for years because it was ME."

"Then do it sneakily. Trick her into confessing," Tyler suggested. "But you'd better do it; she's still suspicious of me since I nicked all her stuff at Burneywood years ago."

"Yeah, why did you do that? You never told me."

"For a dare, obviously. Do you really think I'd do something like that for no reason? I'm nice, remember - not that some people seem to think so," he added drily.

"Let's do this then!" I said. I went across to Carmen's room, though I wasn't completely sure what I was going to say.

"Um, hi," I started. "Are you enjoying Christmas?"

"In this dump? Are you joking?" she said, snippily. "I'm just waiting for a reply from Lily, to see if I can get out of here." At that moment, her phone rang. Her eyes lit up as she read the text.

"YES!" She yelled. "Lily says I can stay with her for Christmas! And Tee, too! Christmas might actually be fun this year! Wait till I tell her!" And she ran out.

"Um, have you forgotten something?"I called after her. "Like, Johnny?" But she was gone. Oh dear.

At that moment, Tyler ran in. "Did you find anything out?" he asked.

"Um, no. And I think there might be a few more arguments in store." I was right. The rest of the day was chaos, with Carmen and Johnny fighting over Tee, who was sobbing.

"Carmen, you've got Lily, but Johnny's only got me," she was saying. "Can't I just see you too on boxing day?"

"No, Lily's seeing her sisters that day, or have you forgotten?" Carmen demanded. "It's no fair, you've got family, but I haven't got anyone. Can't you just think of someone other than your own family for one year? You're the most selfish person I've ever met!"

"LEAVE MY SISTER OUT OF THIS!" thundered Johnny, running in. "She's spending Christmas with ME, like always. So BUTT OUT!" I wasn't even there at the time: they were so loud I could here them from my bedroom. Personally I was on Johnny's side. At least everyone else had stopped arguing, though. Mike had arranged things so that so that Rick could spend Christmas seeing his parents in some hotel rather than visiting them in prison, so he was happier. And Elektra had cheered up immensely from watching me and Tyler suffer. And from then on, nothing else bad happened for a while, so me and Tyler didn't get into any more trouble. Three days later it was the 23rd December, and nothing much had changed. Some people were excited about it nearly being Christmas, whereas others were just dismal. Mo and Floss were still mad at me and Tyler, while we were still mad at Carmen. Since the nothing had happened since the day she got the text from Lily, we were sure it was her. She and Johnny were still at each other's throats. Time was running out for Tee to decide what to do, and she was getting pretty stressed. But she was still determind to be cheerful and christmassy with Faith, Rick, Floss and Mo.

But that day, while I was watching more Christmas TV in my room, I heard a sudden scream. I ran down the stairs, my heart pounding. Because I knew what was coming.

**Who do you think is the culprit? What do you think should happen? Please review and tell me. More tomorrow!**


	5. Chapter 5

**In this chapter, I'll try to use all the ideas people have given me in their reviews. Thanks!**

This time, three people were screaming; Floss, Harry and Mo.

"Somebody's opened all our advent calenders!" Harry sobbed. "And eaten all the sweets!"

"Get a grip!" said Elektra, bored. "There's only two days till christmas, any way. It's not like this will ruin christmas for you." But Mo was yelling.

"It was definitely Jody and Tyler!" He bawled. "Everyone knows they love sweets. _And_ they ruined my treasures."

But I wasn't even listening. I had just noticed my calender. With the last two doors wide open and empty.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Suddenly I knew how everyone else had felt. See, this is why I hate being classed as one of the "little kids". Nothing had happened to _Tyler_'s advent calender. But everyone else was staring at me.

"So it wasn't you, then?" asked Faith, "Who did all those things?"

"Of course not!" I snapped. "Do you seriously think I'd do something like that? But I'll tell you one thing. Whoever did do this is going to pay." At least now me and Tyler were off the hook, though. But I was seriously mad at Carmen, and also about my advent calender. And she was still being horrible to Johnny, and putting pressure on Tee. But I had a good idea how to find the real culprit. But I waited till the next day to tell Tyler my plan.

"What we have to do," I said, on Christmas Eve, at 6:38 pm, "Is do something really fun and christmassy for Carmen to ruin. You know, lay a trap. Then we can lie in wait, and film it."

"That's actually a very good idea," Tyler grinned. "So what do we do?"

"Well, what do people do on the 24th December?"

"Um, hang up stockings?" Tyler was confused.

"Exactly! So we make our own, you know, have a stocking decorating session. Then we hide, and wait! But quickly. We can't afford any nasty surprises on Christmas morning."

So that's what we did. We printed off a load of christmassy pictures, and glued the whole sheets onto old stockings. Then, we put the ones that Floss, Harry, Tee and Mo had made in a safe place, and hid in the kitchen. It was pretty hard trying to keep quiet, though. We kept fidgeting, and could hear Johnny and Carmen's arguing voices getting louder and louder. Then suddenly Tee screamed.

"Stop it! I'll do what **I** ant this Christmas, and there's nothing you can do about it! We heard her run out - but suddenly her footsteps came closer. No way! Not Tee, the friendliest, most cheerful girl here. But she ran in, picked up the kitchen scissors and started cutting up the stockings. She didn't stop until they were nothing but confetti of what was once red felt and cheap white paper. They fell to the floor, and suddenly Tyler couldn't stay hidden.

"Aha!" He said. "We've caught you on film now, we've got evidence." Then he gasped. "I forgot to press record!"

Tee ran out, Mike ran in.

"We've caught you two red-handed now," he said, "and you're in real trouble."

**Sorry, I know this is an incredibly short chapter, but I'll definitely write more later today. Please send in ideas of what you want to happen, I _will _be using them.**


	6. Chapter 6

Everyone was running in now. I couldn't believe it. Now everyone thought it was us again. We were really in trouble. Tee was there too, but there was no way of proving she was to blame, and not us. And she wasn't about to admit it. I still couldn't believe she of all people had done such a thing. I never even listened as Mike started reeling out punishment. I was just so astonished.

Everyone was listening now, looking at us accusingly, yelling at us. And then, above the angry shouting, somebody suddenly shouted, "All right, it was me."

It wasn't Tee. It was Rick.

"What?" me and Tyler exclaimed together.

"I ruined the mince pies. And the decorations. I was just feeling so rubbish at having to spend christmas visiting my parents in prison. And some people were so cheerful, it made me sick. And then I overheard Tyler and Jody planning to do something fun this christmas. And I was going to miss it. So I ruined things for them, and framed Jody and Tyler. I'm really sorry. But then, things got better for me. So I stopped. But I don't know who did the other stuff."

I could not believe it. If there's one person here who's anywhere near as nice as Tee, that's Rick. But those two were the culprits. Who'd have thought? And they'd both been so cheerful, and had families to spend christmas with. But then I realised that everyone had been so wrapped up in their own problems they hadn't noticed the two people suffering most. And growing desperate. But everyone else was still confused.

"Who could have done everything else?" asked Frank. "It was Jody and Tyler who suffered the next two times, so it can't have been them."

"That was the point," said Tee. "It was me. I was so angry at everyone for putting pressure on me, and I had to take it out on someone. Then I remembered the other things that had happened. But I couldn't let Tyler and Jody take the blame again. So I ruined their things. But they laid a trap, and tried to film me. That's why they were here. Only Tyler forgot to press send. It's ok, though. I've admitted." Now I wasn't the only person looking gobsmacked. And most astonished of all was Mike.

"So there we have it," he said. "I'm sorry, Jody and Tyler, for blaming you. And as for Rick and Tee... I think Jody should decide on their punishment. She's the one who's suffered the most. So what do you say, Jody?" I thought about it.

"Can we let them off?" I asked. "It's christmas, after all, and they've both had a pretty rough time. If that's ok."

"Fine." Mike smiled. "I think you two should be thankful to have such a forgiving friend."

"I've decided what to do, by the way," Tee said suddenly. "I'm staying here, with Johnny. Sorry, Carmen."

And everyone was happy. Even Carmen, especially Johnny. He was ecstatic. Now, all we had to do was plan how to make christmas amazing. Me and Tyler were still planning. All we needed was the help of Tee and Rick.

**I'll write the conclusion later today. Please review and tell me what you think!**


	7. Chapter 7

That night, me, Carmen, Tyler, Tee and Rick waited till all the lights had gone out and everyone was asleep. Then we crept out and met up in the landing.

"Here goes." I said. "Have you got everything?" Everyone nodded. Everything seemed to be going to plan. Then, suddenly, a light went on in the living room.

"Oh great," I muttered. "I forgot Mike would be filling all the stockings and stuff."

"Don't you mean Santa?"

I sighed. "Carmen, there aren't any little kids here. You don't have to pretend."

"What? I'm not pretending! Do you mean he's not real?"

"You still believe in Santa Claus?" Tyler, Tee and Rick said together.

"Well, if he's not, how come I've been in and out of care, or with my mum, with or without a boyfriend all my life and still got nothing but make up, accessories and chocolate every year?"

"Um, maybe because those are the only things you like which fit in a stocking?" I pointed out. "Now, let's go!"

It took all night to do everything, but somehow we managed it by 3am. We were all completely exhausted, off course, but it was worth it seeing everyone's faces the next day.

The whole place was draped from top to bottom with decorations made by Tee, and christmas music written by Rick, sung by Carmen and performed and recorded by the rest of us blared out. Mike wasn't exactly happy with Tyler's contribution; indoor fireworks left over from bonfire night, but I knew exactly how to win him round, and give the rest of us a (vaguely) fun day out. I waited till Faith, Carmen, Rick, Elektra, Harry and everyone had gone, and then I went up to Mike.

"What I'd really like to do," I said, "Is go bowling!" Everyone groaned, but Mike was happy. And it turned out to be pretty fun (mainly cos I won).

Then, Mike took us to the Pizza Hut and we all had a great lunch and, best of all, the unlimited ice cream! I went home feeling slightly sick but happy. How strange that everything had gone from being so bad to so good, just in time for Christmas. Maybe there was something to it, after all.


End file.
